Happy New Year!  Jack Rabbit!  Carpe Diem!  Welcome 2008!!!   I hope you are off to a great start on the road to a wonderful year ahead.

This may be old news now (literally last years), but this past weekend we decided to get out of town and squeeze in one last family adventure for 2007.  We traveled to a not too distant city (this town used to mean Army-Navy games to us).  Can you guess where we went?  Take a look at the picture of this historical landmark –

If you didn’t recognize Independence Hall (or if you’re not quite sure where that is), then maybe these pop culture icons will give it away…

So maybe that last picture was a little too large.  The highlight of our trip for me was visiting this incredible landmark.  If you haven’t figured it out yet, I know this next picture will ring a bell. 🙂

It was so interesting to read the stories about who created the Liberty Bell, how it cracked, and to see memorabilia from its travels across the country.  As I’m sure you’ve guessed, we visited Philadelphia!  During our brief visit, we visited what may be the largest Macy’s ever and happened upon an amazing Dicken’s Village where we could walk through the pages of “A Christmas Carol”…what a classic!  There was also a light show in the cavernous, 12 story department store.   We were there just in time to catch it.  In the next photo you will see the world’s largest still-operating pipe organ with shoppers below.  My husband was so impressed that he said he’d love to make a visit to Philadelphia an annual tradition around Christmas time.

Other highlights included authentic gelato, made by a wonderful man who came to the United States from Naples when he was 15 years old.  We also experienced Belgian sugar waffles from a neat coffee shop called Bonte.  Now it wasn’t all about eating…we also strolled Antiques Row (in the rain) where we saw everything from the oldest American hospital (still in use) to interesting shop windows such as this toy shop:

What a memorable way to end the year.  Overall 2007 was quite a memorable year!  sweet bead studio was born and went live!   I want to close this post by saying thank you to all of you who helped make this beading chapter of my life a reality.   Thank you to my terrific friends, family, and customers.  And a very special thank you to a few exceptional people in my world of jewelry:  Chrissie, Kim and Kerry. 

Wishing you all the best in 2008!

~ Cindy